Two Models of Equality and Responsibility

Abstract: Much recent political philosophy has focused on the role of responsibility
within liberal-egalitarian theories of justice, and much of that has been very critical of
Rawlss Theory of Justice. This debate overlooks a central distinction within the
taxonomy of theories of justice. There exist at least two visions of how a liberalegalitarian theory of justice can integrate considerations of distributive equality and,
derivatively, responsibility. What differentiates these two versions is whether distributive
equality is taken as immediately plausible or a direct expression of respect for persons (or
a related notion), or whether distributive equality is derived only in the presence of
additional claims about normatively relevant relationships among persons. These models
imply distinct accounts of how responsibility may be integrated into accounts of liberalegalitarian justice. This fact allows us to show that, contrary to what has motivated much
of recent political philosophy, as far as responsibility is concerned, Rawlss approach is
not already problematic on its own terms.

1. Introduction
1.1 Much recent political philosophy has focused on the role of responsibility within
liberal-egalitarian theories of justice.1 John Rawlss theory, in particular, has come in for
criticism in virtue of its account of responsibility, which Rawls takes to be tied to his
account of primary goods.

Primary goods themselves have been rejected as the

appropriate currency (or metric) of distributive justice, while Rawlss treatment of

responsibility has been criticized as implausible or even inconsistent. These criticisms
have given rise to much of the constructive work political philosophy has done after
Rawlss Theory -- one may think of the work of Richard Arneson, G. A. Cohen, Ronald

Many thanks to Arthur Applbaum, Robert Hockett, Waheed Hussain, Martin ONeill,
Tim Scanlon, the participants of the conference on the Theory and Practice of Equality,
held at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard in April 2004, and the
participants of the Graduate Fellows Seminar at the Center for Ethics and the Professions
at Harvard for discussion of and comments on earlier versions of this paper. Many thanks
also to two referees and the editors of this journal.

Dworkin, and John Roemer, for whom a major concern is to make more room for a
suitable notion of responsibility.2 Their efforts are shaped by a distinction between
choice and circumstance: individuals should possess distributive shares in
accordance with their choices (for which they are responsible) and be compensated for
disadvantages they have because of their circumstances (for which they are not.) These
writers are sometimes called luck-egalitarians (cf. Anderson (1999) and Scheffler
(2003)), but their concerns are more aptly emphasized by calling them, following
Arneson, responsibility-catering egalitarians.
There are two accounts of how responsibility-catering egalitarianism relates to
Rawlss Theory. The first emphasizes continuity: Rawls offers insights about the role of
responsibility in social justice but leaves them underdeveloped, and it is up to others to
fill the gap. The second account emphasizes discontinuity: to the detriment of his theory,
Rawls fails to discuss responsibility adequately, and thus social justice must be
reconceived to accommodate an appropriate notion of responsibility. The continuity
reading appears in Kymlicka (2002), and a recent interview suggests that Dworkin also
endorses it (cf. Pauer-Studer (2002)).3 The discontinuity reading appears in Roemer
(1996). We believe there are strands in Rawls (1999a) to support both readings, but on
balance, as Scheffler (2003) also argues, the discontinuity approach is the better reading:
the differences between a Rawlsian account of social justice and responsibility-catering
2

Cf. Cohen (1989), Dworkin (1981), Dworkin (2000), Arneson (1989), (1990) and
(1997), and Roemer (1996).
3

This is a bit surprising, since Dworkin (1981) introduces the criticism of Rawls that his
difference principle is insensitive to questions of responsibility in terms that fit the
discontinuity reading. Brian Barry seems to be at least sympathetic to the continuity view
as well: cf. chapter 9 of Barry (1995), especially pp 54-55.

egalitarianism are too big to support an account highlighting continuity. In this spirit, we
must proceed to offering actual responses to the objections to Rawlss treatment of
responsibility that motivate responsibility-catering egalitarianism.4

1.2 Much of this debate overlooks a central distinction within the taxonomy of theories of
justice. There exist two different visions of how a liberal-egalitarian theory of justice can
integrate considerations of distributive equality. On the first account, distributive equality
- of whatever it is that is distributed is a necessary implication of the foundational moral
commitments of a theory of justice. We will refer to this type of theory as a direct theory
of distributive justice. There are at least two possible ways in which such a theory might
be constructed. The moral relevance of distributive equality might be understood in
axiomatic terms: for such a theory, the distributive equality is the foundational
commitment of the theory, and there are no more basic claims from which distributive
equality is actually derived. Such accounts are committed to distributive equality at the

There are related contributions in the literature. Lippert-Rasmussen (2001) and

Scheffler (2003) discuss similar themes but their discussions of criticisms of Rawls focus
on Dworkin. Scheffler (2005) argues that luck-egalitarianism is misguided because their
reasons for wanting to integrate responsibility into egalitarian theory conflict with the
concerns that motivate egalitarianism to begin with. In our terminology, Scheffler could
be straightforwardly classified as an indirect theorist who argues against direct theorists
that they have lost sight of the importance of morally important relationships before the
background of which concerns of distributive equality become relevant. (A similar point
holds for Anderson (1999).) Schaller (1997) discusses Arneson, but his concerns are
somewhat different. Ripstein (1999) can be understood as systematically developing the
implications of the Rawlsian division of responsibility within legal contexts (while his
chapter 9 and Ripstein (1994) also look at the wider distributive context). Our
contribution is twofold: first, we develop a distinction between different ways in which
the notion of responsibility can be integrated into a theory of distributive equality. And
second, we apply this distinction to objections against theories such as Rawlss based
upon a supposedly inadequate notion of responsibility. We focus on Arneson and Roemer
because their arguments have not yet received adequate commentary.
3

axiomatic level. The currency, or metric, of distributive justice is such that distributive
equality is by itself a demand of liberal egalitarianism. More often, however, the moral
relevance of distributive equality is understood as an immediate implication of some
more foundational notion of equal respect for persons, or some similar notion of moral
equality. Such accounts are committed to distributive equality as a direct derivation of
their moral axioms. While equal distribution of the currency of distributive justice is not
here an axiomatic demand of liberal egalitarianism, equal distribution follows, without
additional assumptions, from the conception of equality developed. Treating people as
moral equals, for such theories, implies the provision of equal distributive shares. For
our purposes, what links such theories and axiomatic theories is the fact that in both cases
distributive conclusions may be derived from abstract moral egalitarianism. We will
refer to all such theories as direct theories of distributive justice.5
The alternative account might be referred to as an indirect theory of distributive
justice. Here, distributive equality may be derived from an account of equal respect of
persons or some other account of equal personhood, but only in the presence of (and
essentially through, in a sense explained later) additional claims about normatively
5

Our use of direct and indirect should not be confused with the use of these terms in
the analysis of consequentialism. In that context, this terminology is used to distinguish
conceptions of consequentialism that assess the objects of evaluation (normally actions)
in terms of their consequences from conceptions that assess them in terms of rules or
motives that in turn have good consequences. The former set of conceptions of
consequentialism is sometimes called direct (and act utilitarianism is a common
example), whereas the latter set is sometimes called indirect (rule utilitarianism being a
common example). (Cf. article on Consequentialism by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong in
the on-line Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism/). We do not claim any link between
the notion of directness in the two contexts; rather, the notion of a direct theory of
justice refers only to the process of logical deduction, not as in the case of
consequentialism the level of specificity at which moral conclusions are derived.

relevant relationships among persons. The particular case we will be interested in is one
in which the additional relationships are ones of shared citizenship.6 Such accounts of
liberal egalitarianism are committed to indirectly derived distributive equality. On this
third model we cannot automatically infer any (even prima facie) injustice from
distributive inequality, as we can on the other two. Distributive inequality may merely
reveal that the relevant relationships do not hold. What concerns us in this study is the
difference between direct and indirect models of distributive justice. The former defend
distributive equality without making this demand dependent on the presence of
normatively relevant relationships that not all persons may (and in practice will not)
share, whereas the latter do appeal to the presence of such relationship. We will refer to
both models characterized by axiomatic distributive equality and accounts characterized
by directly derived distributive equality as direct accounts of equality, and refer to
accounts of the remaining type as indirect accounts.
Which model we adopt matters for assessments of distributive inequality. In
particular, these models imply distinct accounts of how responsibility may be integrated
into accounts of liberal-egalitarian justice. This fact allows us to defend Rawls against his
critics, by demonstrating that the criticisms described above use a theory of responsibility
appropriate only to an account of distributive equality alien to Rawlss theory. To wit:
Rawlss, we will suggest, is a theory that endorses indirectly derived distributive equality,

We do not deny, however, that other such relationships might exist; a fully specified
comprehensive liberalism might, for instance, specify certain sorts of distributive
consequences applicable only within the family. Our present focus, however, is on the
particular case of political societies, and we will therefore restrict our attention to those
theories such as Rawlss political liberalism, which focus on distinctively political
relationships such as shared citizenship.

whereas the critics to be discussed hold a theory in which distributive equality is derived
directly. We confine ourselves to liberal-egalitarian theories of justice because the debate
we discuss is internal to that family of theories. We confine ourselves, further, to
explicitly egalitarian theories of distributive justice, although what we say applies also to
variants such as prioritarianism. The distinction between those three approaches to
equality carries over to such theories. One cannot avoid the conclusions we draw from
this distinction simply by claiming to be a prioritarian rather than an egalitarian.
We do not here defend an approach to distributive equality. We do think the
approach that derives equality indirectly should be chosen, but our concern is to develop
the distinction and to show that it allows us to rebut certain criticisms to Rawlss account.
This moves the dispute to an assessment of which approach to distributive equality
should be preferred, which is where the debate should be. But as far as responsibility is
concerned, Rawlss approach is not already problematic on its own terms.

1.3 Section 2 describes the models of equality we seek to articulate. We show how the
differences between these models determine the role of responsibility within the chosen
theory of justice. Section 3 discusses the Rawlsian notion of a social division of
responsibility, a conception in virtue of which Rawlss is a model in which distributive
equality is derived indirectly. Sections 4 and 5 apply this distinction to some of the
disputes described above. We seek to show that some of Rawlss critics employ a view
of responsibility that is untenable in light of Rawlss commitments and cannot serve as a
basis for objections. The critics, that is, are committed to a notion of responsibility
available only in direct models of distributive equality. Section 4 establishes these

conclusions with regard to Arnesons criticisms. Section 5 does so with regard to

Roemers. Roemer is not only concerned to show that Rawlss view of responsibility is
inconsistent, but also that egalitarians should drop the veil-of-ignorance device. We hope
to show that Roemer is wrong.7 Section 6 concludes.

2. Direct and Indirect Models of Distributive Equality

2.1 Logically speaking, there are three models of the place of distributive equality within
a liberal-egalitarian theory of justice. While we discuss them, keep two points in mind.
To begin with, in each of these models the goods at issue are whichever goods a theory of
justice distributes. For none of these models does this mean necessarily that those goods
offer a theory of the the good per se though it might, depending on the account.
Moreover, we do not intend for some of these models to capture a moral notion of
equality whereas others capture a political notion. The concern is with a classification of
theories of justice; how the words moral and political are to be used depends on the
details of these theories.8
It is possible, first, simply to stipulate the relevance from the standpoint of justice
of an equal distribution of some good be it welfare, opportunity for welfare, capability,
or some alternative conception. If our conception of equality within a theory of justice is
spelled out in terms of the equality of some good, the distribution of that good becomes
7

Roemer (1996) contains the most extensive critical discussion of Rawls, whereas
Roemer (2002) (drawing in Roemer (1996) and Roemer (2001)) argues that egalitarians
should not use the veil-of-ignorance device.
8

That said, we will talk about moral and political notions of responsibility within the
context of the Rawlsian theory and its critics, but by that time we will have introduced
enough material about the Rawlsian theory for this to be appropriate and clear.

relevant for an assessment in terms of justice without further argument. On this account,
the fact that two individuals differ in their holdings of this good bears immediately on our
evaluation of their situations.

Unless defeated by opposing considerations that the

respective theory of justice may also acknowledge, the conclusion that an injustice exists
is immediately derivable from this situation. An unequal distribution of the relevant good
is prima facie an injustice. We say that such accounts are committed to axiomatic
distributive equality.
In the second model, it is an ideal of equality of persons, most plausibly equal
respect and concern for persons, that calls for the equalization of the distributive goods
identified by the theory as relevant for the purposes of justice. Distributive equality is not
stipulated, but derived from a normative account of personhood. This model is committed
to directly derived distributive equality. While the first and second accounts are logically
distinct, we do not further distinguish between them. An account of distributive equality
committed to axiomatic distributive equality without endorsing any notion of equality of
persons from which the distributive equality can be taken to be derived, though logically
possible, would be rather peculiar. We discuss both types of accounts together under the
heading of direct models.
The third model sees distributive equality as relevant only in a mediated way. The
link between equal concern and respect, or any other notion of equality of persons used in
the respective account, and the distributive goods identified is not through an inference
that requires no additional assumptions; rather, equalization of these goods is demanded
only in the presence of and essentially through additional normatively relevant
relationships among the respective individuals. While distributions of the chosen metric

of goods are not irrelevant from the standpoint of justice, their importance must be
established through additional arguments showing that the relevant relationships hold.
We cannot, from the sheer fact of an inequality in holdings of the good at stake, infer
even a prima facie injustice. This model is committed to indirectly derived distributive
equality. For brevitys sake we talk about the indirect model of distributive equality.9
The qualification only in the presence of and essentially through additional
normatively relevant relationships among the respective individuals requires
elaboration. What this formulation is intended to make sure is that direct theorists could
not simply become indirect theorists by adopting the condition that either the axiomatic
postulation or direct derivation of distributive equality only applies to a certain range of
people (say, those living within a certain jurisdiction). If this were possibly, there would
not be much depth to our distinction. That qualification makes sure that the presence of
those normatively important relationships is actually needed for the derivation of
distributive equality. The next subsection discusses some theorists and thereby should
illuminate the distinction between direct and indirect models, and especially make clear
the relevance of this qualification.

2.2 To illustrate, consider first Rawlss theory of justice. According to Rawls, primary
goods are not always the proper metric for the evaluation of equal concern and respect.
They become the appropriate metric only through arguments demonstrating that they
properly express egalitarian concerns within a particular context the basic structure of a

When we talk about holdings of the good at stake, the good might, of course, be
welfare. So our talk about holdings is by no means confined to material objects.
9

constitutional democracy.10 The underlying notion of equality of persons by itself is not

taken to have distributive implications. Rawlss arguments are designed to show that the
application of such a general framework to a specific social context motivates the
relevance of a specific metric of egalitarian concern a metric which is given its
relevance by that context and is applicable only within that context. This additional
argumentative step marks Rawlss theory as an indirect model of distributive equality.
Direct theories have no space for this argumentative step. An example is a
welfare-egalitarian variation of Peter Singers brand of utilitarianism. Singer (1993) starts
with a principle of equal consideration of interests, which he takes to capture the form of
moral judgments.11 Equal consideration of interests is taken to have immediate
distributive implications, captured in terms of well-being, but for Singer these
implications are utilitarian (maximizing well-being, rather than equalizing it). Neither the
significance of well-being per se nor that of its distribution depends on specific social or

10

The basic structure of society is the way in which the main political and social
institutions of society fit together into one system of social cooperation. The two
principles Rawls argues will be chosen in the original position (behind the veil of
ignorance) to regulate the basic structure are the following (in lexicographic order; cf.
e.g., Rawls (2001), p 42): (a) Each person has the same indefeasible claim to a fully
adequate scheme of equal basic liberties, which scheme is compatible with the same
scheme of liberties for all. (b) Social and economic inequalities are to satisfy two
conditions: first, they are to be attached to offices and positions open to all under
conditions of fair equality of opportunity; and second, they are to be to the greatest
benefit of the least-advantaged members of society (the difference principle).
11

We use Singer as an example because his moral theory is a particularly clear and
simple vision of direct theorizing; we read him as a maximizing utilitarian in the tradition
of Jeremy Bentham. As such, he represents a thinker for whom distributive
consequences are directly the result of his axiomatic structure namely, the welfare of all
sentient creatures. Indeed, he has been particularly forthright in refusing to allow
contextual relationships to enter into his calculations of justice; see Singer (2005).

10

political contexts, and much of Singers work as a whole argues against assigning much
relevance to such contexts. Were Singer a welfare-egalitarian rather than a utilitarian, his
would be a paradigmatic direct account of equality within a theory of distributive justice.
G.A. Cohen, Richard Arneson, John Roemer, and Ronald Dworkin are, on this analysis,
direct theorists as well.
While we will not be concerned with Cohen and discuss Arneson and Roemer in
sections 4 and 5, we should explain why we claim Dworkin as a direct theorist. Dworkin
(2000) explains that his book argues that equal concern requires that government aim at
a form of material equality that I have called equality of resources (p 3). Dworkins
theory of equality of resources attempts to explain how that sort of distributional equality
is derived from equal concern and respect for people. This much seems to qualify
Dworkin as a direct theorist par excellence, but he explains as well that the principle of
equal importance does require people to act with equal concern toward some groups of
people in certain circumstances, and what characterizes these groups is that they are a
political community that exercises dominion over its own citizens, and demands from
them allegiance and obedience to its laws Equal concern () is the special and
indispensable virtue of sovereigns (p 6). In light of this comment he may seem to qualify
as an indirect theorist instead, since his derivation of distributive equality applies only to
people subject to the same sovereign jurisdiction.12
Yet now it becomes important that we define an indirect theorist as one how
derives distributional equality not only in the presence of, but also essentially through

12

This interpretation of Dworkin seems to inform Thomas Nagels interpretation of his

work. See Thomas Nagel (2005).

11

additional normatively relevant relationships among the respective individuals.

Dworkins derivation of distributive equality proceeds independently of these
sovereignty-considerations: restricting the scope of people affected by this derivation in
this manner requires an additional and independent argument, which Dworkin offers. The
fact that the relevant individuals are tied by being subject to the same sovereign
jurisdiction (a constraint explicitly or implicitly built into many theories of justice that do
not take themselves to have international implications) does no work in the derivation of
distributive equality. This sets Dworkin apart from Rawls, in whose account it is crucial
for the derivation of distributive equality that the affected individuals are free and equal
citizens in a system of fair cooperation. For Rawls, it is indeed essentially through
normatively relevant relationships that distributive equality is derived; for Dworkin it is
not. Therefore, as far as the derivation of equality is concerned, Rawls is indeed an
indirect theorist while Dworkin is a direct theorist.
The adoption of such a model has significant implications for the sort of
reasoning that is appropriate for a range of questions, and hence also as to the substantive
conclusions the theorist will reach. It is because of these implications that our
classification is relevant. We will here consider three topics: reasoning about the scope
of such theories will be distinct; about the range of goods over which it has evaluative
jurisdiction; and about the notion of responsibility it takes as salient. The subject of
responsibility will then occupy us for the remainder of this study.

2.3 To begin with, within an indirect account, it is straightforwardly plausible to restrict

the scope of distributive justice to some set of individuals selected by the theory. The

12

contours of this set are determined by the normatively relevant relationships endorsed by
the theory. Within the Rawlsian project, the relevant relationship is that of being jointly
engaged in social cooperation. If the original position is, as Rawls insists, not a device to
be employed every time there is the division of a good, but a heuristic device designed to
show how the principles of justice animating a constitutional democracy might be
derived, the parties to the original position will be limited to those subject to the coercive
control of the political power of the state.13 Generally, what is required of respectful
treatment depends on what structures (cooperative or coercive) the individuals share.
This approach has implications in a variety of areas; perhaps the most important is
that of international justice. For the kind of welfare-egalitarians for whom the fact of an
inequality in welfare is directly relevant, the different levels of well-being in Western and
developing economies are a prima facie injustice.14 Unless some further factor can be
introduced to defeat the conclusion that differing levels of welfare are illegitimate, such
inequality gives us reason to condemn the worlds current economic and social situation.
Yet for Rawls the fact of an inequality in social primary goods becomes problematic as a
matter of justice only within the context of a domestic political society, and only because
equality of persons demands this equalization within this specific context.15

Some

Rawlsians have chosen to extend the scope of the original position past what Rawls

13

14

Cf. Rawls (1993), pp 136-137.

For a well-known example of such reasoning, cf. Singer (1972).

15

For a justification of this reading of Rawls, see Blake (2001). Cf. Risse (2005) for an
account of duties in the international arena that is Rawlsian in outlook.

13

himself regards as its appropriate space.16

Others notably Rawls himself have

rejected this argument; whatever duties of justice exist in the international community,
they will be distinct in form and content from the duties of domestic justice.17

2.4 Reasoning about the range of goods over which distributive justice extends, secondly,
will be distinct in the two models. For the direct model, all aspects of life that influence
the distribution of the good in question are within the purview of justice: since equality of
a certain good is immediately relevant from the standpoint of justice, or is taken as an
immediate expression of equality of persons, whatever affects its distribution might
similarly be regarded as at least prima facie relevant from the standpoint of justice. It will
take independently plausible considerations to exclude some factors that affect that
distribution, considerations that would have to be consistent with whatever reasons the
direct theorist has for choosing the good whose distribution matters immediately and for
insisting on the equality of its distribution.
We may take Andersons (1999) hypothetical idea of compensation for the
sexually unattractive as instructive (cf. p 305). While some theories of justice reject such
an idea, direct accounts can only reject it for second-order reasons; they will invoke
considerations of stability, argue that such compensation risks endangering the just
distribution of goods in other spheres of human experience (perhaps by producing

16

Cf. Beitz (1979) and Pogge (1989). We do not mean to suggest that the adoption of an
indirect model by itself commits one to a view of international justice of the sort captured
by Rawls (1999c). Our point is only that different reasoning will occur in direct and
indirect models when it comes to international justice.
17

Cf. Rawls (1999c).

14

additional evils such as resentment and shame among those so compensated), or that
equality is a political virtue of sorts, one which is only saliently held over a specific range
of goods (excluding sexual attractiveness).18 Yet indirect theorists are able, without
further ado, to restrict the scope of their theories. Indirect theories acknowledge the
existence of normatively important relationships vis--vis which the goods whose
distribution is to be regulated derive their importance, and it is in light of the nature of
that relationship that the range of these goods is restricted. Within the Rawlsian project it
is natural to restrict the range to goods created and distributed through cooperative
activity. Since it is the creation of principles of justice to adjudicate this realm that is
sought, goods outside this realm are not implicated within a direct account of distributive
justice.19

18

It is worth emphasizing that these are two different strategies. The first offers secondorder reasons to defeat what is a prima facie valid implication of a direct egalitarianism;
the second argues that the direct egalitarianism has a space of goods that does not extend
to this particular form of value. The second strategy is one which is available to both
indirect and direct theories; any particular putative good such as sexual attractiveness
might fall outside the range of goods recognized in a given theory, whether indirect or
direct. Our claim at present is that a direct theory can exclude such goods even when
they are indeed potentially relevant from the standpoint of justice, by demonstrating that
the individuals in question do not stand in the correct form of relationship to one another
to make their claims valid. We are grateful to an anonymous editor for this Journal, for
pressing us to be more clear on this point.
19

It is possible, of course, that considerations of sexual attractiveness might fall within

the purview of justice if such goods can be represented as linked importantly to those
goods relevant to political justice. We might imagine, for example, that the attractive
have greater access to political power; in this case, even an indirect theorist would have
to conclude that a maldistribution has occurred. Here, however, the maldistribution
comes in the linkage between the good of political power and sexual attractiveness, rather
than in the distribution of sexual attractiveness itself. The latter, for an indirect theory
such as Rawlss, does not fall within the purview of distributive justice, and so the
distribution of this good may be allowed to retain whatever shape it happens to take.
We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for pushing us to be more explicit on this
point.
15

While the example of the sexually unattractive is fanciful, the difference in range
extends to more serious cases. Kymlicka (2002) charges that Rawls is unable to justify
his refusal to consider compensation for inequalities in natural primary goods (pp 70-72).
He argues that Rawlss reasons for demanding the equalization (subject to the difference
principle) of social primary goods translate to the sphere of natural primary goods; if we
care about human well-being, surely we would care as much about the latter as the
former. Yet the distinction between direct and indirect models demonstrates how this
charge might be avoided. For theorists like Rawls, it is not well-being or life-chances
that are directly relevant for justice. What is relevant is the project of justifying coercive
authority to those subject to a states jurisdiction. In this project, distributive shares may
become relevant, inasmuch as the economy is part of the basic structure. In order to
justify what we do to one another through the basic structure, we have reason to ensure
equalization of the benefits and burdens the basic structure creates. We have reason to
care about distributive shares of social primary goods, because such goods are ultimately
the product of a political community in need of justification.
Natural primary goods, in contrast, exist prior to and (largely) independently of
the basic structure.20 They become relevant only when (and to the extent that) they are
significant for the positions and offices the basic structure creates. On this analysis, there
is nothing inconsistent in insisting that natural primary goods such as talents and

20

We say largely because the influence that natural primary goods will have on
individual life-chances will depend to a great extent on the arrangements of the basic
structure. Moreover, the basic structure can be organized in such a way that it allows
compensation for shortfalls in natural primary goods (e.g. through transfer payments to
the disabled, or, alternatively, through the legal provision of mandatory access for the
disabled to public buildings, etc.). On this, see, for example, Wolff (2002).

16

intelligence must not be allowed to influence distributive shares, barring justification

through the difference principle while insisting also that inequalities in natural primary
goods are not to be compensated for by political authority. (What is more: we hope that
this discussion also makes it plausible that there is a normatively appealing vision behind
these views.) We ensure that intelligence and talents do not illegitimately affect social
primary goods without taking it as required that intelligence and talents themselves be
equalized or compensated for.21 What Kymlicka understands as an inconsistency is the
result of a consistent reading of an indirect model of distributive equality.22
This discussion highlights how using an indirect model of distributive equality
mediated through the kind of reasoning that accompanies it -- has consequences for
conclusions about justice.

The differences in natural primary goods that Kymlicka

highlights are not trivial; differences in natural endowment can represent important
differences in well-being, even when such differences do not become relevant for

21

It should be noted that Rawls briefly adverts, in A Theory of Justice, to a principle of

redress, on which all natural inequalities might be taken as prima facie unjust and
therefore deserving of compensation. This principle, however, is not one Rawls
consistently endorses; he identifies it only as one possible strand in our shared public
understanding of justice, and argues that such a principle is best achieved through the
more constrained conception of justice embodied in the difference principle. As such,
while the principle of redress might be understood as a nascent form of direct theorizing,
it is difficult to ascribe such a principle a significant role in Rawlss thought.
22

It will be useful, at this stage, to recall the distinction between the continuity and
discontinuity reading of Rawls that we briefly addressed in the introduction. One may say
that it is precisely those passages in Rawls that support the continuity reading (and thus
put Rawls in proximity to responsibility-catering egalitarians) that reappear at this stage
and support Kymlickas inconsistency charge. However, this discussion above should
make clear how the discontinuity reading that we favor can accommodate those passages
(in particular Rawlss talk about moral arbitrariness that seems to apply to social and
natural primary goods indiscriminately). That is, concerns about natural inequality do
enter an account of distributive equality, but only in the manner sketched above.

17

positions and offices within the basic structure. The adoption of an indirect model
represents a considered conviction that not all losses, and not all inequalities, matter for a
theory of justice.

We seek to equalize benefits and burdens produced by political

community (with benefits and burdens not so produced entering through their effect on
those that are), so that the authority of political government might be justified; we do not
seek to equalize burdens and benefits themselves. Some losses are left to lie where they
fall, and for others there will be a heavy burden of proof on those who argue that they
should be in the purview of justice. My lack of talent will only be a matter of concern for
a theory of justice once that lack begins to affect the goods I am able to acquire in the
market; considered in itself, it is simply bad luck.

2.5 The third and for our purposes most significant implication of our distinction
concerns different possibilities for integrating a suitable notion of responsibility into an
account of distributive justice. Note first, however, that there is nothing internal to either
direct or indirect accounts of justice per se that compels them to accommodate a notion of
responsibility, so the reasons for wanting to do so must arise independently. We will see
below how such reasons arise for Rawlss indirect account, so here we merely point out
how they may arise straightforwardly on a direct account.
For illustrative purposes, suppose first our direct theorist is a welfarist. Welfarists
make an individuals claims to distributive shares dependent on factors that do influence
her welfare, but that many think should not bear on her distributive share. One key
example is the expensive tastes problem. This problem involves an individual
deliberately cultivating expensive tastes and thereafter asserting a claim for greater

18

distributive shares. Here, however, it is intuitively inappropriate to cater to such desires;

thus many theorists attempt to construct an account of responsibility in which the agents
deliberate choice to develop these tastes is taken as sufficient reason to deny them as
sources of egalitarian claims.
Suppose now our direct theorist is a resourcist. By way of contrast with welfarists,
resourcists face a fetishism objection: it is not the possession of resources as such that we
should care about (at least not exclusively), but what resources do for people. Without
any fault of their own, that is, in a manner that cannot be traced to any voluntary choices
they made, some people have more needs than most (e.g., handicapped people), while
others may have acted in ways that make them deserving of more than an equal share
of resources. Again, the notion of responsibility enters as a means of correcting the
defects of an egalitarian distribution; here, the fact that the disability is not something for
which the agent is morally responsible might be used to justify her greater claim upon
resources.
Both of these direct theories therefore seem to require corrective criteria to be
plausible as accounts of distributive justice. Considerations of voluntary choice provide
such criteria. We can see, then, how it is tied to this notion of voluntary choice that the
notion of responsibility may enter such accounts.

The notion of responsibility is

employed to adjust and improve the egalitarian distribution of the theory in question.
This brings consideration of responsibility into the heart of our discussions of distributive
equality.
To capture the difference between direct and indirect theories as far as
responsibility is concerned, we need to look at the notion of responsibility in a bit more

19

detail. To this end, recall Scanlons (1998) distinction between responsibility as

attributability and substantive responsibility. To say that a person is responsible, in this
sense, for a given action, says Scanlon explaining the former notion, is only to say that
it is appropriate to take it as a basis of moral appraisal of that person (p 248). As
opposed to that, judgments of substantive responsibility express substantive claims
about what people are required (or () not required) to do for each other (p 248). The
two notions are distinct; Scanlon denies that we may always infer substantive
responsibility from the fact of attribution. The notion of responsibility we are interested
in for questions of distributive justice is substantive responsibility, where it will be an
additional question whether that notion is also tied to a notion of responsibility as
attributability. In the welfarist and resourcist cases just discussed judgments of
substantive responsibility are tied to judgments of responsibility as attributability, and the
latter is flashed out in terms of voluntary choice.
More generally, on the direct model, substantive responsibility can enter in two
ways. First, it can enter as a defeating condition: if individuals freely choose to engage
in activities resulting in a shortfall of the designated good, that shortfall can legitimately
be ascribed to them. It no longer represents an injustice, but a matter of individual
responsibility; a matter of choice, instead of circumstance. Here, the individual is
substantively responsible for the shortfall; the apparent deviation from equality is
excused in virtue of its connection with voluntary choice. Conversely, if an individual
can argue that she does not have responsibility for some shortfall, she may have a claim
to be compensated. An individual with an unchosen handicap, for instance, may have a
claim to additional resources, given the fact that she is not responsible for her condition.

20

In both cases, considerations of responsibility motivate why an individual would get

more or less than others. The second way of integrating substantive responsibility into a
direct theory is by means of the very concept of an equal share itself. Imagine, for
example, that individuals are given an adequate supply of cash, which some rash
individuals choose to burn.

We might resist their claims for compensation not

immediately through the concept of choice and circumstance, but simply by noting that
they have indeed been given the equal share required; their foolish choice does not negate
the fact that we provided what was morally demanded. Here, responsibility does not
enter in a way that justifies deviations from the standard of equal shares; it enters,
instead, by way of modifying what counts as an equal share to begin with.
In both cases, however, substantive responsibility is integrated into an account of
distributive justice by way of qualifying the direct inference from equality of persons to
the equality of their distributive shares (or, if the respective direct account is one that
postulates distributive equality axiomatically, by way of modifying what precisely is
postulated). Again, in both cases it will, logically speaking, be an additional question of
whether judgments of substantive responsibility are tied to responsibility as
attributability. In the welfarist and resourcist case discussed above, this was the case, and
responsibility as attributability was understood in terms of voluntariness. This is typical
of common versions of direct accounts of distributive justice. What is crucial now is that
these are the only two ways in which substantive responsibility could be integrated into a
direct account of distributive justice.23

23

Within different theories, of course, substantive responsibility will be understood in

different ways. Dworkin (2000), for instance, holds people responsible only for choices
that derive from preferences with which they identify. Cohen (1989) and Arneson (1989)
21

As opposed to this and this is the central point of difference between direct and
indirect models, as far as responsibility is concerned -- the indirect model can make room
for substantive responsibility within a theory of distributive justice in a markedly
different way, one that not only entirely disconnects judgments of substantive
responsibility from responsibility as attributability, but also utilizes the structure of
indirect theories. (To be clear: the intimate connection between substantive responsibility
and responsibility as attributability is a typical feature of direct theories, which tend to
spell out attributability in terms of voluntariness in the manner of the welfarist and
recourcist considered earlier; this connection is, however, not logically required for direct
theories. The logically crucial difference stems from the fact that indirect theorists can
introduce a notion of substantive responsibility that makes use of the structure of their
theories.) The indirect model does not license the inference to distributive equally unless
the relevant individuals stand in certain normatively important relationships. Indirect
theorists can make room for substantive responsibility by way of fleshing out those
relationships, and therefore they can obtain a notion of substantive responsibility that is
neither available nor will seem plausible to direct theorists. A paradigmatic relationship
of that sort is that of being jointly involved in a system of fair cooperation over time, a
system whose members are free and equal citizens. Substantive responsibility can be
integrated into this kind of indirect model by way of developing this idea of a system of
fair cooperation among free and equal citizens.

locate the cut differently, advocating that individuals be held responsible for choices they
have made in awareness of their consequences. And Roemer (1996) thinks that people
should be held responsible only for those choices that similarly situated others would
have avoided.

22

This is very abstract, but how concerns of responsibility can be integrated into
indirect models is best fleshed out within that indirect theory with which we are primarily
concerned, that is, Rawlss theory. In section 3 we will first develop the notion of
responsibility within Rawlss theory (which will make clear what we mean by saying that
indirect theorists can make room for substantive responsibility by way of fleshing out
those normatively important relationships), and then examine two of the most
sophisticated critiques of Rawls by those who charge him with an inadequate notion of
responsibility, namely, Richard Arneson and John Roemer. We claim that both are
committed to a direct theory of distributive equality, as well as to a version of this stance
that ties responsibility as attributability to substantive responsibility. Therefore Rawls, as
an indirect theorist who disengages substantive responsibility from responsibility as
attributability, is not susceptible to their criticisms.
Rawlss indirect theory offers resources to develop a distinctly political notion of
substantive responsibility that has little to do with the moral notion of responsibility as
attributability, and that is neither open to nor will be otherwise plausible to direct
theorists. While there may be good reasons for adopting a direct model of distributive
justice, one cannot argue for such a model merely by showing that the indirect model
does not fit with our moral account of responsibility. The indirect model does not even
try to fit such a notion, since it must develop a distinct account of responsibility
appropriate to the development of principles sufficient to ensure and justify the ongoing
project of social cooperation.

3. A Social Division of Responsibility

23

3.1 A discussion of responsibility is notoriously absent from Rawlss Theory. Yet while
responsibility never gains much prominence on his agenda, Rawls does offer the
following account in several subsequent essays (emphasis added):
This conception [of justice] includes what we may call a social division of
responsibility: society, the citizens as a collective body, accepts the responsibility
for maintaining the equal basic liberties and fair equality of opportunity, and for
providing a fair share of the other primary goods for everyone within this
framework, while citizens (as individuals) and associations accept the
responsibility for revising and adjusting their ends and aspirations in view of the
all-purpose means they can expect, given their present and foreseeable situation.24
Rawls claims that this understanding of responsibility is implicit in the choice of primary
goods. That claim is puzzling. One may have thought that the issue of what currency to
choose for distributive justice (with e.g., welfare, resources, and capabilities competing
with primary goods) is both conceptually prior to and independent of how responsibility
is divided between individuals and society. We will have taken a big step towards
understanding Rawlss account of responsibility and its place within his theory once we
understand his claim that this account is implicit in the choice of primary goods.

24

This quote is from Social Unity and Primary Goods, Rawls (1999b), p 371; see also
Fairness to Goodness, Rawls (1999b), p 284, Reply to Alexander and Musgrave,
Rawls (1999b), p 241, A Kantian Conception of Equality, Rawls (1999b), p 261; see
also Justice as Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical, Rawls (1999b), p 407. Two
questions that arise here is to what extent Rawlss theory might have changed between
the view presented in Theory and his subsequent writings, and, by way of approaching
that question, whether the social division of responsibility that appears in these later
writings fits completely comfortably with everything that Rawls says in Theory. We will,
however, not pursue these points here any further.

24

Interestingly, we get to the same question when studying Scanlons (1998)

discussion of Rawlss account. Scanlon asks why the parties in the original position can
reasonably make their choice of principles of justice in terms of expectations. Reminding
the reader that, for Rawls, the choice of primary goods as a measure of expectations
amounts to a certain social division of responsibility between social institutions ()
and individuals, Scanlon explains:
The idea is this: The basic structure of society is its legal, political, and
economic framework, the function of which is to define positions to which
different powers and economic rewards are attached. If a basic structure does this
in an acceptable way if citizens have no reasonable complaint about their access
to various positions within this framework or to the package of rights, liberties,
and opportunities for economic reward that particular positions present them with
then that structure is just. It is up to individuals, operating within this
framework, to choose their own ends and make use of the given opportunities and
resources to pursue those ends as best they can. How successful, unsuccessful,
happy or unhappy they are as a result is their own responsibility. (p 244)
What is puzzling is this. Plausibly it is the choice of the principles of justice that
makes for a society that assures individuals of a basic stock of primary goods. Yet the
principles can be chosen only after Scanlons question has been settled, namely, why the
parties can reasonably make their decisions in terms of expectations. Only after it is
decided that primary goods are the currency and after parties in the original position
have started to think of their choice in terms of expectations of such goods can they select
principles. Scanlon can talk the way he does only if the choice of primary goods already

25

amounts to a social division of responsibility. For then his answer to the question he
raises does not depend on the availability of the principles of justice at that conceptually
earlier stage. But then again we must ask: what does it mean that the choice of primary
goods amounts to this division?

3.2 To answer this question, we must revisit the core idea of Rawlss theory. The most
fundamental idea in this conception of justice, so Rawls (2001) tells us, is the idea of
society as a fair system of social cooperation over time (p 5). The participants of this
system are considered free and equal, each with his or her own life to live, but also living
together. They are regarded as equal in the sense that they are capable of engaging in
social cooperation over a complete life as one among equal citizens. They are considered
free in the sense that they regard both themselves and each other as having a conception
of the good, and as entitled to making claims on their political institutions to be in a
position to advance their respective conception of the good (provided those conceptions
are in accordance with the conception of justice). Such a system of cooperation aims to
realize appropriate conceptions of freedom and equality simultaneously.
Such a system can exist over time only if, first, the possession of certain goods is
regulated in such a manner that the fairness of the interaction and the participants status
as free and equal citizens is maintained over time, and this leads to social primary goods
as the metric of distributive justice: those are the sorts of goods participants need to this
end. (This regulation will entail in particular that each citizen has an appropriate share of
these goods, goods that individuals need as citizens, Rawls (2001), section 17.) Second,
such a system can exist over time only if it is the responsibility of citizens as a collective

26

body to assume responsibility for organizing the basic structure in such a way as to
support such a system of cooperation. Otherwise, the aggregative effect of individual
decisions may, over time, undermine the status of some participants as free and equal
citizens. (Think of certain forms of capitalist free markets without noticeable
redistributive efforts: the workings of the market may bring it about over time that some
participants are no longer free and equal.) Third, cooperation can remain fair, and
individuals free and equal, only if they do not, beyond reasonable limits, burden others
with the costs of their decisions. Individuals must take responsibility for their ends before
the background of a collective responsibility for the maintenance of the justice of the
basic structure. As Rawls (1993) explains:
[V]ariations in preferences and tastes are seen as our own responsibility. ()
[T]hat we can take responsibility for our ends is part of what free citizens may
expect of one another. Taking responsibility for our tastes and preferences,
whether or not they have arisen from our actual choices, is a special case of that
responsibility. As citizens with realized moral powers, this is something we must
learn to deal with. (p 185)
That is, individuals will have to take substantive responsibility for their tastes and
preferences regardless of whether these tastes and preferences can also be attributed to
them and are thus their responsibility also in that sense or that is, will have to do so
before the background of a basic structure whose social positions are regulated by
Rawlss two principles. Responsibility as attributability, on this account, does not bear on
substantive responsibility. As Scheffler (2003) puts the point:

27

People are asked to accept responsibility for their ends, in Rawlss sense, not
because the metaphysics of the will makes it fitting that people should bear the
costs of their choices, but rather because it is reasonable to expect people to make
do with their fair shares. (p 27/8)
The second and third point (in terms of the enumeration in the second paragraph
of this subsection) deliver Rawlss division of responsibility. This account is implicit in
the choice of primary goods in the sense that both the former and the latter are essential
to the conception of society as a fair system of cooperation among free and equal citizens
over time. What accounts for the choice of primary goods as currency is precisely what
also accounts for the endorsement of a social division of responsibility, namely, the
concern to maintain such a system of fair cooperation, which in turn depends on both
those components. For Rawls, then, contrary to what seemed plausible above, the
question of the currency of justice does not arise conceptually prior to or independently
of the question of who is responsible for what. Both questions are answered
simultaneously, by way of explicating the system of fair cooperation at the core of
Rawlss theory. This makes also clear why for Rawls social justice does not reduce to
distributive justice conceived narrowly in terms of who should have what.25

25

This subsection has progressed without mentioning the original position, but the latter
can easily be integrated into this account. The original position is a device of
representation by which we may determine what must be the case for a political society
to be justified in its use of coercion. Individuals are precluded from knowing their class,
plan of life, or genetic endowment; the principles derived under conditions of ignorance
are deemed justified by the absence of any information which might represent illegitimate
bases of argumentation. The original position is intended, through what sources of
reasons it excludes, to model those forms of reason we think could be accepted as
reasonable bases of agreement between free and equal persons. It is supposed to model
what reasons we can legitimately provide in the justification of coercion. On such an
indirect model, the ordinary moral notion of responsibility will not directly enter into an
28

Compare this outlook with Cohens (1989) claim that the primary egalitarian
impulse is to extinguish the influence on distribution of both exploitation and brute luck,
where [a] person is exploited when unfair advantage is taken of him, and he suffers from
(bad) brute luck when his bad luck is not the result of a gamble or risk which he could
have avoided (p 908). While concerns about exploitation and brute luck do have their
place within the conception of responsibility developed here, they do so derivatively of
the general idea of maintaining a society as a fair system of cooperation, rather than by
way of capturing a primary egalitarian impulse.

3.3 Thus tied to Rawlss notion of a fair system of cooperation, his notion of
responsibility is designed to govern the assignment of burdens within such a system. As
more information about society becomes available, this conception of responsibility also
guides the choice of a constitution, then the design of laws, and, ultimately, the outcomes
of adjudication. All of these steps are constrained by the demand that society remain a
fair system of cooperation among free and equal citizens. Individuals take responsibility
for their actions within the framework thus determined, which means they benefit from or
assume the burdens of their choices within those constraints.
This account of Rawlss social division of responsibility should explain our claim
that indirect theorists can make room for substantive responsibility by way of fleshing out
the normatively important relationships whose presence they require to license inferences
to distributive equality. For Rawls, these relationships are those of jointly participating in

account of justice. We must ask, instead, about what forms of individual responsibility
are relevant from the standpoint of the justification of political coercion.

29

a fair system of cooperation, and it is features of that system that allow him to make room
for a notion of responsibility. This notion of responsibility does not satisfy the demands
on such a notion that arise in moral philosophy,26 and it does not gain its respectability
through being embeddable into an overall plausible account of the free-will problem; it is,
in particular, not reducible to notions of responsibility current in that context, such as
responsibility drawing on causal involvement and responsibility drawing on voluntary
choice. The Rawlsian notion of responsibility cannot play such roles, as much as these
moral conceptions are unsuitable to ensure that burdens are distributed in a manner that
guarantees the continuation of fair cooperation among free and equal citizens.
The fact that primary goods are chosen because they are what persons need as free
and equal citizens entails that moral responsibility should not be required and not be able
to influence an individuals guaranteed share and thus her substantive responsibility. Just
as the sort of respect individuals are due according to the Kantian moral law is not the
sort of respect they must earn or of which they must show themselves worthy, so in the
Rawlsian system, individuals receive shares of primary goods without needing to show
themselves worthy or deserving of it. There is no room for a full-fledged notion of desert
to enter Rawlss theory in a way that influences individuals distributive shares, nor is
there such room for a notion of responsibility as attributability. There is no need for the
addition of such notions either.27

4. Criticizing Rawls on Responsibility, One: Arneson

26

This point is also emphasized in Schaller (1997).

27

Cf. Rawls (2001), section 20, on desert.

30

4.1 Richard Arneson has been concerned to argue, in a variety of contexts, that Rawlss
principles of justice are inadequately sensitive to choice. Over the last decade and a half,
he has defended welfarist accounts of egalitarian justice against Rawls and Dworkin.
These efforts were accompanied by an exploration of ways in which the notion of
responsibility could be integrated into a theory of distributive justice. In his publications
around 1990 Arneson held a desire-satisfaction account of welfare (cf. Arneson (1989),
(1990a), (1990b)). This account entered into his theory of equality of opportunity for
welfare, which also brought to bear his ideas about responsibility on distributive justice
(cf. Arneson (1989), (1991)). Arnesons more recent writings endorse an objective-list
account of welfare, rejecting equality of opportunity for what he calls responsibilitycatering prioritarianism (inspired by Parfit (1998) and related work; cf. Arneson (1999a),
(2000b), and (2001)).28 Arnesons extensive criticism of Rawls draws on both his
welfarist commitments and his concern to find an appropriate place for responsibility
within an egalitarian account of justice, and this concern is our subject now.
While it has taken on different forms over the years, one recurring critique is that
Rawlss difference principle misallocates social primary goods by ignoring the morally
relevant distinction between choice and circumstance. In particular, Rawlss vision of
distributive justice illegitimately penalizes people for disabilities or innate preferences
not properly understood as aspects of choice; it will treat such unchosen aspects of the
person as if they were chosen. According to Arneson, this demonstrates that Rawlss

28

Prioritarians are unified by demanding special consideration for those who are least
well-off, according to the given metric.

31

vision of responsibility is inappropriate for a theory of distributive justice. We will

discuss this criticism first, and then, in 4.4, turn to a second one.
The particular version of the objection we consider is set within the context of a
discussion of employment (cf. Arneson (1990b)). Arneson explores whether a program
guaranteeing access to productive employment could replace a program guaranteeing
direct access to money and wealth. He notes that a program focusing on productive
employment may illegitimately discriminate against those who have an innate aversion to
wage labor and employment: among the class of persons who are both disadvantaged and
unemployed, some will have a pronounced taste for leisure, so that their welfare
prospects would not be enhanced by egalitarian provision of employment opportunities.
These persons can be labeled needy bohemians. From a welfare-egalitarian standpoint,
the policy of offering aid to the disadvantaged in the form of job opportunities rather than
cash transfers is a good idea only if the desirable effect of screening out non-needy
bohemians (who should not be targeted by welfare programs) from the policy outweighs
the undesirable effect of screening out needy bohemians (who should be).

4.2 This discussion does not by itself pose an objection to Rawls. It does, however,
represent a clear difference between Rawls and Arneson as regards the ways in which
responsibility enters into discussions of distributive justice. Arnesons welfare-egalitarian
contention is that needy bohemians, who have an unchosen aversion to waged labor
ought not to be penalized for their antipathy towards work: the fact that they would be
screened out by a measure that offers state-guaranteed employment instead of financial
aid speaks against such a measure. To put this point in Scanlons terms: needy bohemians

32

should not be held substantively responsible for their apathy towards work because this
apathy is not attributable to them.
As we saw in section 3, for Rawls judgments of attributability do not bear on
substantive judgments. The difference principle, which governs the allocation of primary
goods to productive social and political positions, does not even attempt to distinguish
needy bohemians from those who freely choose to avoid work. Having an aversion to
work is insufficient to justify compensation; even if it is inborn, and thus part of an
individuals set of background circumstances. On Rawlss account, individuals must
adjust their plans of life to those that can be justified through the use of practical reason,
or else bear the costs herself.29 On Arnesons welfare-egalitarian account, this gets it
backwards: society must adjust itself so as to ensure that unchosen preferences do not
penalize individuals in the distribution of goods. Arneson, that is, ties responsibility as
attributability to substantive responsibility.30
Arnesons account is an instantiation of the direct model of distributive justice.
Where there is an inequality in what goods individuals possess, we have on a direct
account such as Arnesons good reason to think that an objectionable inequality exists.
(The goods here are individual welfare levels.) The notion of responsibility, on this

29

See Rawls (1999b), p 368.

30

Arneson (1997) makes a similar point: A person who is very talented and possesses
desirable traits such as charm and gregariousness may have a decided and steady
preference for leisure over money-making activity, and may adopt a plan of life that
involves voluntary avoidance of such activity. Even though his bank account wealth and
income are low, he is living well, but Rawlsian justice lumps him together with the
desperately poor who are barely able to find marginal employment and scrape by
(Arneson (1997), p 4). Later Arneson (1997) summarizes his point by saying that [t]he
difference principle mixes together deep and shallow inequalities promiscuously (p 5).

33

account, enters as a defeating condition: what prima facie seemed like an injustice turns
out not to be one once an appropriate appeal to responsibility is made. By the same token,
since such a defeating condition does not apply to Arnesons needy bohemian, she cannot
be held responsible for her plight and a plausible theory of distributive justice must
ensure that such an individual is not disadvantaged by her condition.

4.3 This is a coherent vision of distributive justice. The difficulty we seek to address is
when the notion of responsibility animating this vision is taken to defeat the distributive
conclusions of an indirect theorist such as Rawls. To take Arnesons needy bohemian as
an objection to Rawls is to wrench a direct notion of responsibility out of context, and use
it against a theory over which it has no purchase.
Arneson contends that the needy bohemian deserves compensation deserves,
that is, to be treated in the distributive realm no worse than individuals whose unchosen
preferences lead to productive employment. Yet according to indirect theorists, we must
ask not simply whether the individual is responsible for her preferences, but whether she
can use these preferences legitimately to press claims against others. The standpoint of
an indirect theorist such as Rawls is that we must determine principles by which a
constitutional democracy could justify its political coercion to all those who face it. In
determining whether such principles mandate treating the needy bohemian in the manner
recommended by Arneson, we must ask whether there is anything in this construction
demanding such treatment. It seems, however, that there is no such demand. On a
treatment such as Rawlss, the desire to spend ones life in an unproductive pursuit to
avoid employment benefiting the society as a whole, as part of a system of social

34

cooperation is like a demand to free ride on the efforts of others. It represents an

attempt to gain the benefits of cooperation without providing any benefits.31
Rawlss notion of a social division of responsibility supports the idea that some
disadvantages remain the responsibility of individuals. Individuals maintain the freedom
to evaluate and pursue a plan of life, but within the range of such plans compatible with
the cooperative system advantaging all members of society. Individuals whose natural
disposition is geared towards productive labor will find this requirement easy to meet.
Individuals who do not have this disposition, like the needy bohemians, bear the burden
of adjusting their plans to those that might be justified to others through the process of
public reason. Yet this inequality in costs does not have to be ameliorated by society.32

31

One may say that what counts as free-riding will vary depending upon social norms;
we might encounter norms permitting certain individuals to receive compensation while
avoiding market-based labor. This is correct; what counts as free-riding is not a
descriptive question, but a normative one, and we must admit that the precise contours of
such norms may admit of more than one answer. Our point, however, persists; the mere
fact of having an unchosen preference against productive labor does not, on an indirect
theory, mandate compensation. The question of compensation looks not to what is
chosen, but to what can be justified to others. That the latter question is likely to prove
complex does not mean that it is not, for an indirect theorist, the correct one to ask.
32

This explains, further, why Arneson could not rephrase his notion of equality of
opportunity for welfare as something which might be chosen behind the veil of ignorance
and, therefore, as an indirect theory. If a given division of welfare is depicted as
something we might choose together rather than a direct implication of the moral nature
of welfare - then it is no longer the case that we can simply use the moral notion of
responsibility to work out what distributive shares are deserved. We must, instead, seek a
distinctively political reason for determining which sorts of distribution will lead to
political demands. It is conceivable that Arnesons notion of equality of opportunity for
welfare might be the end result of some such political process; but, in this case, the
reasons for valuing the distribution would be quite different than Arnesons own. To
transform Arnesons egalitarianism from direct theory to indirect theory, in other words,
would be to undercut his arguments against Rawls, which rely upon a non-political notion
of moral responsibility. We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for this Journal for
pressing this objection against our position.

35

It is the responsibility of individuals to adjust their preferences so that their participation

within that system does not become the functional equivalent of a decision to defect.33

4.4 What we have discussed so far is Arnesons criticism that Rawlss difference
principle misallocates social primary goods by not giving proper weight to responsibility.
However, Arnesons work contains a second line of criticizing Rawlss treatment of
responsibility.

According to this objection, to the extent that Rawls does integrate

responsibility (an extent that is, according to the first objection, too small), he does so in
an implausible and possibly inconsistent way. Arneson objects to Rawlss social
division of responsibility on two grounds. On the one hand this account is hard to
combine with the absence of responsibility from the difference principle: if individuals
are responsible for their ends, why does Rawls not hold them responsible for being
among the least advantaged (cf. Arneson (1990a), (1997))? Here, so Arneson suggests,
Rawls comes at least close to presenting an inconsistent theory. On the other hand,
Arneson argues that this idea is too demanding and thus implausible. His endorsement of
33

It is important to note, here, that Rawlss position and Arnesons may in practice lead
to similar results. Both will insist that individuals who can choose to alter their plans of
life to fit the requirements of cooperation will have to do so. Rawls might, further, allow
some cases of truly pathological aversion to work to count as a disability, and consider
such people as falling outside the set of persons understood as functioning members of
society; this part of Rawls, we should note, is underdeveloped and in need of fleshing out
see Nussbaum (2006) for an analysis of these issues. The primary difference here is not
with such rare and extreme cases, but with the more ordinary cases, in which the costs of
altering ones plans of life are significant but not debilitating. Arneson would regard a
superable but significant aversion to work as a significant moral factor, one which is
deserving of compensation; Rawls, in contrast, would regard such an aversion as simply a
matter of bad luck something one must overcome in order to stand in mutually
justifiable political relationships with others. Here, again, the difference is one of
philosophical methodology, rather than political conclusion. We are grateful to an editor
of this Journal for pressing us to be more specific on this point.

36

individuals responsibility for their ends commits Rawls to individualism with a

vengeance, depriving his theory of any possibility to consider predictably blighted lives
of some of its least fortunate members (Arneson (1997), p 16) as being within its scope.
Let us begin with the inconsistency version. An inconsistency arises only if one
thinks about Rawlss division of responsibility as if it involved a notion of responsibility
drawing on voluntariness, that is, a notion of responsibility as attributability. For then
Rawls would have to explain why voluntariness is decisive for the assignment of costs
and benefits in some contexts, but not in others. The mere insistence that, in the one case
we talk about the basic structure and in the other about actions occurring within society
may not satisfy the critic. For once it is assumed that what individuals have claims to is
determined by their own features (what they have chosen voluntarily) it may seem
bizarre that the domain in which their choices occur should make a difference.
Yet this perspective is alien to the core of justice as fairness. The point of justice
as fairness is to distribute burdens in such a manner that a fair system of cooperation
among free and equal citizens is preserved, which requires a division of responsibility as
suggested by Rawls. No inconsistency arises, and one would think so only if one
endorses a direct theory of distributive equality. Rawlss theory, in other words, does not
begin with the idea of moral responsibility, and then adapt it to politics; he begins,
instead, with a political notion of what can be justified to free and equal citizens, and then
develops a conception of responsibility specifically designed to work within this political
theory of justice. The more ordinary notion of moral responsibility may be relevant in
this process, but it need not always be so; we may not, therefore, infer any moral

37

inconsistency when Rawlss political notion of responsibility runs afoul of the moral
notion animating Arnesons own conception.
What about the implausibility version of Arnesons objection? Is it appropriate,
within a theory of justice, to hold people responsible for ends, or does Rawls not thereby
assign responsibility a function it cannot plausibly have? One way of questioning whether
individuals should be held responsible for their ends appears in Arneson (1997):
[T]he distinction between inequalities arising from choice and inequalities arising
from unchosen circumstances turns out to be confused, because unchosen
circumstances include each individuals talent endowment, and among ones
talents are talents to make and implement good choices in formulating a
conception of the good and devising a plan of life. (p 14)
So by holding individuals responsible for their ends we indulge in the illusion that there
is a genuine choice unaffected by factors that may deprive them of that responsibility.
Yet since there is no such choice, this view amounts to individualism with a vengeance.
The response must be, once more, that the problem arises only if one thinks about
the Rawlsian conception of responsibility as if it were a notion of responsibility drawing
on voluntariness. If what individuals have legitimate claims to depends on their voluntary
choices, it is easy to see how this would amount to individualism with a vengeance. That
notion of responsibility, however, is Arnesons, not Rawlss, and he and other
responsibility-catering egalitarians have been taken to task for it in Anderson (1999). The
Rawlsian system, to use a formulation due to Ripstein (1999), is based on the idea that
equality and responsibility need to be understood together, in light of the idea of

38

reciprocity (p 21).34 Before this background, individualism with a vengeance must be

seen as a phenomenon rather alien to Rawlss theory. Such vengeance is a threat to
responsibility-catering egalitarianism that uses a choice-based notion of responsibility.

4.5 There are some difficulties in these answers to Arneson. The first is the distinction
between disability and expensive preference. Individuals with disabilities preventing
them from participation in productive employment are guaranteed compensation and
resource shares on Rawlss account. There is a relevant difference between those who
cannot work, and those who prefer not to work.35 Nonetheless, it must be recognized that
this line may be difficult to draw in particular cases. Rawls assumes that individuals will
be able to adjust their preferences to productive pursuits, while the disabled will be
unable to adjust their circumstances to permit employment. In the majority of cases, this
assumption will be correct. The distinction, nonetheless, might prove problematic. A
further difficulty is found in the notion of productive employment itself. What counts as
cooperation what counts as productive employment is not an empirical question, but a
normative question. As such, it admits of different answers.36 Whether the competitive
market is an adequate guide to those forms of pursuit providing benefits to others is a
34

This is actually what Ripstein (1999) says is the central theme of the book.

35

Goodin (1985) insists that, on theories making use of the idea of society as a
cooperative venture for mutual advantage, those too weak to participate productively
must rationally be excluded from membership in the community. As applied to Rawls,
this seems to us inaccurate; members of political community who are unable to work
because of unchosen disability are nonetheless entitled to have the political coercion they
face justified to them a process of justification which may involve a model such as that
developed by Rawls. See Goodin (1985) p. 156.
36

Cf. Waring (1990).

39

question we cannot address here. Nevertheless, such a question must be answered for
indirect theories such as Rawlss to be acceptable.37

5. Criticizing Rawls on Responsibility, Two: Roemer

5.1 Like Arneson, John Roemer has developed a series of criticisms of Rawlss concept
of responsibility. The one we examine deals with questions of effort and desert. Roemer
takes his arguments (in conjunction with objections to Dworkin and Harsanyi) to entail
that veil-of-ignorance arguments do not support egalitarian conclusions, advising
egalitarians not to use the veil-of-ignorance devise. We have nothing to say about
Roemers arguments against Dworkin and Harsanyi, but argue that Rawlsians can
maintain the connection between the veil of ignorance and egalitarian conclusions. The

37

What about Arnesons (1997) point that [t]he difference principle mixes together deep
and shallow inequalities promiscuously (p 5), where deep inequalities are beyond the
individuals control (and thus not their responsibility), whereas shallow inequalities are
due to voluntary choice (and thus are)? Curiously, Rawls also talks about deep
inequalities, insisting that it is such inequalities to which his principles of justice apply
in the first instance (Rawls (1999a), p 7). What Rawls counts as deep inequalities are
inequalities arising from unequal starting positions. Regulating such inequalities is the
target of Rawlss theory. Shallow inequalities then are those not due to unequal starting
points, but, presumably, due to the actions of individuals in a manner that cannot be
account for by a reduction to unequal starting points. Rawlss distinction between deep
and shallow inequalities is at odds with Arnesons, which is drawn in terms of the
voluntariness of actions: shallow inequalities are those due to voluntary actions and
require no redress, whereas deep in inequalities are due to circumstances not brought
about by voluntary actions and thus do. The Rawlsian distinction between inequalities
arising because of the socio-economic constitution of society and inequalities arising
because of individual actions within such structures is ill-captured in terms of voluntary
and involuntary actions. For if inequalities arise because of unequal staring points, they
do so regardless of whether they are maintained by voluntary or involuntary actions. The
language of voluntariness ignores that concern. The domain of Rawlsian principles of
justice are institutions, rather than individual actions. Institutions, unlike actions, are illassessed in terms of the distinction between the voluntary and the involuntary. As far as
principles of justice for the basic structure are concerned, that distinction does little work.

40

work will be done, once again, by the distinction between direct and indirect accounts of
distributive equality.
Where Arneson contests that Rawls illegitimately punishes people for unchosen
unproductive plans of life, Roemer is concerned that Rawlss refusal to regard effort as
giving rise to desert fails to give people proper credit for freely chosen decisions to work
hard. This contention is expressed by a comparison between effort and plans of life:
[Rawls] assumes that individuals do not know their life plans behind the veil of
ignorance, although we may suppose they know the joint distributions of such life
plans and all other resources. But if life plans are not morally arbitrary, then why
should individuals in the morally correct posture for making the social contract
not know them? And why should they not know their propensities to expend
effort, or, rather, that part of effort for which individuals are morally responsible?
After all, the veil of ignorance is only supposed to shield individuals from
knowledge of their morally arbitrary features. (Roemer (1996), 175-176)
This critique is best understood in terms of Rawlss notion of responsibility. Both
plans of life and knowledge about effort are hidden in the original position. Yet why
should we hide from individuals the knowledge about their propensity for effort, where
that effort is the result of free choice?

Rawls seems guilty of falsely ascribing to

circumstance what should be understood as free choice, thereby refusing to credit

individuals for choices for which they actually are responsible. Roemer insists that
individuals should know their life plans behind the veil. But if so, says he, many will
reject the difference principle. So Rawls must drop either the claim that the veil admits all

41

and only morally relevant information (depriving it of its purpose), or he else his claim
that the original position offers an impartial viewpoint delivering egalitarian conclusions.

5.2 This critique, like Arnesons, rests on an assumption that the relevant notion of
responsibility is one found within the direct model of distributive equality. It is an
attempt to read the direct model back into Rawlss original position. Whatever is morally
arbitrary, on this reading of Rawls, cannot serve to ground a difference in the allocation
of goods. The critique charges that Rawls is inconsistent in his handling of plans of life
and effort; if both are morally arbitrary, neither can justify inequalities in distributive
shares. Since effort at least partly represents free choice, Rawls errs by refusing to give
individuals credit for these choices.

Respecting individuals, for Roemer, means

compensating them for choices for which they are morally understood as responsible.
Yet the original position is not designed to eliminate all aspects of the person for
which we cannot claim responsibility. It is not a replication or formalization of the
ordinary notion of moral responsibility. It is, instead, used to generate principles that
could legitimately govern cooperation. As Rawls says,
[w]e must specify a point of view from which a fair agreement between free and
equal persons can be reached; but this point of view must be removed from and
not distorted by the particular features and circumstances of the existing basic
structure. (Rawls (2001), p 15)
He goes on to explain:
In the original position, the parties are not allowed to know the social positions or
the particular comprehensive doctrines of the persons they represent. They also

42

do not know persons race and ethnic group, sex, or various native endowments
such as strength and intelligence, all within the normal range. We express these
limits on information figuratively by saying the parties are behind a veil of
ignorance (Rawls (2001), p 15; cf. Rawls (1999a), sec. 24; Rawls (1993), p 24f).
Crucially, the language of morally arbitrary features is ill-suited to depict the purpose of
the original position. For the original position serves to capture conditions under which
an agreement about principles governing a system of fair cooperation can be reached. It
is not simply a way of spelling out the moral notion of responsibility for choice; it is,
instead, a method for working out principles for fair political agreement and the notion
of responsibility it implies is internal to this task, rather than something derived from our
moral general ideas of moral responsibility.
Ones plan of life, on this analysis, is not best described through the idea of moral
arbitrariness.

It has a distinct place within the process of generating legitimate

cooperative principles. It shares with effort the fact that plans of life, by themselves,
cannot justify differential shares within a cooperative system; I cannot simply cite the
inherently superior nature of my way of life in arguing for a higher share of distributive
goods. The original position therefore excludes knowledge of plans of life to ensure
impartiality in the selection of principles. Such plans are not arbitrary, but they cannot be
legitimately appealed to in the construction of legitimate principles we can expect
contracting parties to endorse. A plan of life, however, is distinct from effort. Plans of
life, from within the methodology espoused by Rawls, must be respected to the extent
that they can be made compatible with other plans of life, as part of the broader process
of respecting individuals. Given that the cooperation we seek is to occur within the

43

context of a broad diversity of plans of life and views about the good, we must respect
these plans of life if we are to determine principles all participants have reason to accept.
We may thus examine plans of life with reference to the idea of political
coercion. We seek to justify such coercion to free and equal persons. We cannot insist
that a single way of life is inherently superior to another. Nor can we make our own way
of life an illegitimate burden upon others, by refusing to cooperate in productive activities
underlying social cooperation. The veil of ignorance, understood in this light, does not
model conclusions about moral arbitrariness, but a political conception of what burdens
we can legitimately place upon others. Plans of life are excluded in the original position
not because they are morally arbitrary, but because of the unique place of such plans in
the justification of political coercion. Rawlsian liberal egalitarians have, therefore, no
need to abandon the use of the veil of ignorance in their theoretical explorations.

5.3 What, then, of effort? While effort is similarly excluded from what is known in the
original position, the reason for its exclusion is distinct. Both effort and plans of life, we
may acknowledge, are morally mixed. They are both the result of a combination of free
choice and unchosen circumstance. From the standpoint of a theory concerned to justify
political coercion to free and equal persons, the question arises: can such an aspect of
persons legitimately ground an inequality in distributive shares? The answer to such a
question may be controversial, but to answer no seems at least a plausible response.
Principles allowing even partly caused aspects of persons to influence distributive shares
directly in this way might be legitimately resisted by reasonable persons.

44

It is worth noticing that the question asked by Roemer depends upon an ability to
discount circumstance from choice that seems utterly unavailable to limited creatures
such as ourselves. The only question we may ask is whether effort, taken as a whole,
may legitimately influence distributive shares; focusing upon that proportion of effort due
to choice assumes knowledge we do not, and could not, have. This is why Rawls terms
reward for effort impractible, rather than illegitimate. Were we able to perform the
hypothetical calculation imagined here, we would perhaps have reason to do so. Given
the very human nature of our knowledge, however, we cannot; and given this fact,
distributive principles rejecting rewards for effort are in line with notions of
responsibility that can be used in indirect models. It is also worth noticing, finally, that
the question of effort is perhaps less important than is generally assumed. The only form
of effort for which we receive no credit is effort within a given profession or social
position. Cooperative systems such as Rawlss, however, allow differential rewards to
flow to different positions; and they allow talents and ambitions to determine the
allocation of persons to positions.38 The talent set of any given individual, however, is
far from static. An individuals effort in the development of new talents, the refinement
of existing talents, and the acquisition of new skills enables her to attain new positions.
All this, of course, is perfectly in harmony with Rawlss system, which does not
seek to equalize individual talents but marshal those talents for the benefit of all. What
this means, however, is that individual choice to expend effort will often be rewarded
with additional distributive shares. Individuals expend differential amounts of efforts
38

Rawlss system may also allow differentials within positions, when those differentials
result from choices for leisure time versus other goods. A dentist who chooses to treat
more patients may legitimately gain more income than one who chooses to treat fewer.
We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for raising this point.
45

within a given social position, and they expend differential amounts of efforts in
professional and social advancement. The former sort of differential gives individuals no
claim upon others for additional goods; the latter, however, may legitimate differential
rewards, as individuals develop differential sets of talents and skills. Rawls is frequently
accused of insufficient sensitivity to effort by those who assume talents to be static.
When this view is replaced with a more dynamic conception of talent, we find that
individual effort may be relevant to distributive shares in a real, albeit indirect, manner.
In a nutshell, then, Roemer, like Arneson, does not have a case against Rawls, and
the reason for this is that he, again like Arneson, endorses a direct model of distributive
equality, rather than an indirect one.

6. Conclusions
Nothing we have said here mandates the choice of an indirect model of distributive
equality. We hope only to have demonstrated that the distinction between indirect and
direct models of distributive equality is a valid, and important, distinction. We hope,
further, to have demonstrated that the conceptions of responsibility accompanying these
models are similarly distinct. Those theorists who would seek to critique the validity of
an indirect theory of distributive equality, therefore, have more work to do than simply to
demonstrate the ways in which such theories are incompatible with a direct notion of
responsibility. The indirect model is immune from such criticisms, inasmuch as it relies
upon a distinct notion of responsibility involved in the justification of political coercion,
rather that the perhaps more immediate moral notion of moral responsibility. The critics
of indirect theorists such as Rawls may, in the end, be correct; but such critique cannot

46

proceed in the manner in which it has generally been undertaken. A fresh start is
required; and, until this task is undertaken, indirect theorists such as Rawls may take their
theories to have survived the challenge posed by responsibility-catering egalitarians.

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